Saturday, February 6, 2016

Hello friends! Welcome to a special bloghop that I am participating in with a group of my creative pals celebrating "For the Love of Mixed Media". Not only are we sharing our passion for all things mixed media... we have projects with a LOVE theme.

If you arrived here in the middle of the hop, you can CLICK HERE to jump over to Christy Strickler's blog who is our hostess and organizer of this Cre8time adventure and some amazing Valentine's Inspiration!

I haven't been doing so much creating lately, though I'm always up for a good challenge and an opportunity to just dump out some stuff and play. I have been itching to use this shield pendant that has collaged paper with a phrase "beauty lies within" {from a supply goodie box I purchased from my creative friend Catherine Scanlon}. I had plans of making a necklace with it and molded up some items to pair with it... but my muse had other plans.

I also brought out one of my special stamps that is from a dear friend from my local altered book group who passed on several years ago. Her vast collection of stamps were made available for sale to a special group of creative friends and I have about a dozen of her stamps {one of which is this corkscrew topped lady head}. I like to think that when I use these stamps... my muse and my dear friend are having a Cre8time playdate.

There was a heart collaged in this bezel, though I wanted to use a chipboard piece that was a different size/shape - so I had to tear it out. I brushed the metal frame with some tarnished brass and red distress paint, then lined the inner edge with some mini red sequin trim held in place with Diamond Glaze.

The rest of this came together rather organically as I had to paint a bunch of stuff red in an effort to clean up spilled paint from opening the newest RED distress paint dauber. So my chipboard heart, and grungeboard wings, some book paper and this tag were quickly painted red and tarnished brass. I build up the base of the tag with a torn scrap of an embossed painted paper in my stash, some mini rick-rack, sari ribbon, gold trim and painted lace.

The grungeboard wings are stamped with script text and my lady is stamped onto painted book paper accented with distress markers for a touch of color.

Needless to say I think more color is now on my hands than on anything else - LOL! I added a trimmed off piece of embroidered trim for a necklace... I love when those little scraps find a use while I'm assembling things.

I finished off bodice with a beaded dangle that was in my stash o' findings which was a perfect match for this color palette. I topped off the tag with some sari ribbon, fun fiber and green/red raffia. A work of mixed media love!!!

Tuesday, February 2, 2016

Hello friends and Happy February... the month of LOVE! This month the Designer Crafts Connection is feeling the Cre8time "Love in the Air" and sharing Valentine's Day projects. CLICK HERE to hop on over to the Designer Crafts Connection blog and be inspired!

Today I'm sharing a super fun and easy way to dress up your morning coffee for your Valentine with some custom shaped sugar cubes... and this is certainly a project that you can do with the kiddos.

Using some heart-shaped chocolates from the Dollar Tree {my favorite guilty pleasure}, I created a mold with Amazing Mold Putty. I hot glued four of them onto my glass craft mat and pressed the mold putty around them. I didn't even bother unwrapping them. I love the texture of the foil on the chocolates. To view how Amazing Mold Putty works... CLICK HERE.

By the way... did I mention

that my new DIY mold

is FOOD SAFE!!!

Next thing I did was rummage around my pantry for my collection of Wilton colored sugars for cake decorating and grabbed a couple recycled wooden coffee stir sticks and mini silicone mixing cups.

Quick and easy indeed! I poured a little bit of each color into a silicone mixing cup, added just a couple drops of water and stirred until the sugar was the consistency of wet sand at the beach.

Then I poured the mixture into the mold and pressed the sugar making a compact cake. This is just like packing wet sand to make a sand-castle... and just as fun – tastes better, too!

A little *TIP* – if you heat your Amazing Mold Putty mold up in the microwave a minute or two {test this first at 15 second increments to see how hot your device heats it and please use oven mitts} before putting sugar mixture into mold, it will help them dry out faster. Do not cook the sugar in the mold... it will melt or burn giving a completely different result.

**PLEASE NOTE** For your safety - please don't use a mold for food items if you have already used it for resin or other art products.

I didn't have any pink sugar... so I easily whipped some up using my natural cane sugar and one drop of red food coloring and a couple drops of water. This project took about half an hour and I made several of each color - and a couple different shapes from other hearts previously molded. My hubs will be quite surprised when I have some of these on the table for Valentine's Day brunch.

WELCOME to the blog for sbartist (Susan M. Brown) - mixed media artist and graphic designer.I frequently lurk around in the dark creating art while all in the world are asleep. What will I dream up next...